The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus, a data analyzing method and an information recording medium.
Widespread use of digital cameras and hard disc recorders has enabled recording and storing of a number of static images and dynamic images into various media in an electronic data form. Conventionally, processing for displaying a list of thumbnail images for each image is known in order to facilitate quick access to a necessary image out of the recorded and stored number of images.
However, too many thumbnail images being displayed in order by date confuses users and cannot quickly guide the user to the image the user wants to access. Now, the inventors of this application have developed a technology to display images as a result of analyzing the association between a number of images (elements to be analyzed). According to the technology, among a number of images, a “space image” is displayed where the images that have a higher association with each other are displayed at closer positions and the images that have a lower association with each other are displayed at farther separated positions, thereby enabling a user to quickly retrieve the image they want from a number of images. This technology can be applied not only to static images but also dynamic images, characters and voice data by analyzing the elements to be analyzed for their mutual association and displaying the result as a space image. Specifically, the technology can be used to visualize the results of analysis.
However, according to the study made by the inventors of this application, this technology has a problem in that the number of elements to be analyzed is analyzed immediately for the mutual association between them, which eliminates minute feature differences between the elements to be analyzed and does not produce a result that reflects the differences.
The present invention was made in view of the above problem and one object of the present invention is to provide an image displaying apparatus, an image displaying method and an information recording medium that enables quick retrieval of the image a user wants to access from a number of images.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an image displaying apparatus, an image displaying method and an information recording medium that can visualize the mutual association between a number of elements to be analyzed and can visualize the minute feature differences between a part of the elements to be analyzed as needed.